Cultural Transformation

We are each of us impacted by change – at the individual, team and organizational levels.

FountainBlue’s Cultural Transformation initiatives will drill down into how we can help individuals reach for excellence, how we can help teams work better together and how an organization can inspire and motivate its teams and leaders to deliver exceptional solutions.

  • We address cultural transformation at the employee, team, and organizational levels individually and in concert overall.
  • We provide one-on-one coaching and workshop training to work with employees and teams on skills development to meet current and anticipated work needs.
  • We work with employees at all levels – from executives to board members, from interns to individual contributors – to gather input and perspectives and facilitate participation and engagement in the cultural transformation process.
  • We tailor our cultural transformation initiatives to meet your specific needs, and work with you to tweak the strategies, plans and programs as market, customer, employee, and organizational needs change.

FountainBlue’s CEO Linda Holroyd provides leadership development support through one-on-one executive coaching services, through team facilitation and management training services, through strategic consulting and advisory services, and through cultural transformation consultation.

Our motto is ‘facilitating leadership and innovation one leader, one team, one organization at a time’.

How we lead cultural transformation – at the Organizational, Team, and Individual Levels

FountainBlue works with client companies to create custom qualitative and quantitative measurements on each of the ingredients for excellence: at the individual, team and organizational level. With these measurements, our clients can:

  • more transparently and clearly communicate, collaborate and connect around cultural transformation objectives;
  • more easily document progress and strategize plans for improvement; and
  • more effectively ensure alignment with their mission, vision and core values.

FountainBlue’s cultural transformation initiatives focus on providing strategic consultation at the organizational level, scenario planning at the team and individual levels and results-based execution at all levels.

Strategic Consultation at the Organizational Level: 

1. Evaluate the current situation and desired end state in light of  current market, technology and customer trends. 

2. Empower the leadership team and key stakeholders to define the strategy and vision. 

3. Enlist input and participation from a wide range of stakeholders. 

4. Conduct strategic scenario-planning with the intent of optimizing people, processes and results. 

Scenario Planning at the Team and Individual Levels: 

5. Integrate strategic goals into operational plans based on a range of scenarios. 

6. Facilitate ongoing conversations to ensure alignment between groups and individuals. 

7. Ensure access to resources and feedback to enable successful implementation. 

8. Encourage and reward strategic problem-solving and decision-making which is collaborative, transparent, and results-oriented. 

Results-Focused Execution at the Organizational, Individual and Team Levels: 

9. Create and sustain a growth mindset which embraces failure and invites respectful diversity in thinking, speaking and acting. 

10. Invite the input and perspectives of laggards, outliers, skeptics and under-performers while celebrating the successes of leaders, managers, and collaborators.

If you have specific questions on how we facilitate cultural transformation, please sign up for a no-obligation 15-minute call by visiting https://cal.mixmax.com/fountainblue/15.

Transformation at the Organizational Level

As part of our June 2024 VIP Roundtable on the Future of Work topic, I challenged myself to add updates to a post I submitted to Quora in June 2016, which I’ve included below. I would say that things today are the basically the same, but sadly, not all employees are making the choices to succeed, and not all companies are making the choice to thrive.

Making a Choice as an Employee

Things are the same because being a tech-philic, learning-agile, customer-oriented, positive, resilient and humble employee greatly sets people up for success. In fact, it does so more today than it did in decades past as we face the accelerated changes of the next normal. So I ask you, what choices are you making to enable you (and others around you) to gravitate toward these mind-sets?

Keys to a Cultural Transformation at the Team Level

The needs are similar for teams, but amplified. It’s much more important today than to be communicative, inclusive, connected, proactive, open-minded, other-centered and collaborative than ever before. More is at stake but fewer teams can manage and lead well.

Keys to a Cultural Transformation for an Organization

Sadly, not all companies are making those choices. Our cultural transformation initiatives work with our client companies to better make those choices, while delivering impactful business results.

We work with teams within the organization, and also with individual team members to transform the culture, the business and themselves.

I also agree with what I said eight years ago – managers and leaders need to build a culture based on meritocracy, data and information, a culture which is clear about objectives, roles and responsibilities, a culture which rewards productivity, initiative and innovation, a culture which embraces empowers, enables and engages a wide range of workers.

How will work in the future differ than work as we know it today?

Post on Quora, by Linda Holroyd, Exec Coach, Tech Adviser, CEO of FountainBlue, June 2016

There’s been so much change in the way companies, leaders and businesses work with each other and together, so it’s difficult to plan your future, whether you’re new to the workforce, returning to the workforce or planning how to remain gainfully employed in later years. Here are my thoughts on the type of work that’s available and how to embrace these opportunities and and prepare for the challenges to come.

  1. The tech-philic worker will be favored, and those who reject or deny this fact will be much less employable. Technology will help workers to gather and interpret data and information so that they can be more productive and better serve the customer, both of which are critical to the performance of any company.
  2. The learning-agile worker will be favored. Those who are resistant to learning new ways of doing things will be left behind, especially as automation will replace the need of workers-who-perform-repetitive-tasks.
  3. The communicative worker will more likely succeed as it would be easier for them to work with all the internal and external stakeholders involved in any job – from colleague to teammate, from partner to customer.
  4. The patient, helpful, service-oriented worker will be better positioned to serve demanding customers. There will always be jobs for people who know how to make even the pickiest of customers happy.
  5. Collaboration between people and companies will more likely succeed. Leaders will be those who can envision the benefits of collaborating across roles, companies and industries, and create and facilitate those successful partnerships.
  6. If you combine the 5 traits above, you will find a worker who may be able to tailor products and services to the needs of the customer. There will always be a role for people who can succeed in doing this well.
  7. Company leaders will be more focused on data and analytics, and there will be more meritocracy-based cultures and less politics.
  8. Along those same lines, productivity of people and product/service lines will be based more on data and information, and less on politics and agendas.
  9. Company leaders will help make it easy for a diverse population of workers to succeed – whether it’s making remote work possible or providing tech tools to support an aging or disabled or other non-standard worker.
  10. The bottom line is that companies and leaders will acknowledge that they are only as good as their people, and think, speak and act accordingly.

Those are my thoughts on the Future of Work. How will these things impact YOU?

Report on The Future of Work

McKinsey’s June 10, 2024 Chart of the Day showcased results from a survey of more than 1,000 global C-suite executives, about 40 percent say there’s a shortage of workers with critical thinking and other higher cognitive skills.

Given the challenges for employees, teams and organizations, and the shifting future of work, FountainBlue provides custom training and development programs for teams and organizations focused on delivering the social and emotional skills necessary to succeed.

  • Adaptability
  • Communication
  • Negotiation
  • Creativity
  • Entrepreneurship
  • Interpersonal skills
  • Empathy
  • Leadership and Management
  • Teaching and Training

At the team level, FountainBlue supports individual workers and teams to work collaboratively to improve higher cognitive functions needed for the future of work:

  • Complex information processing
  • Communication and Coordination
  • Critical thinking
  • Decision-Making
  • Problem-Solving
  • Optimization and Planning
  • Leadership and Management
  • Project Management

At the organizational level, FountainBlue works with senior executives to strategize on how to meet the needs of the employees, the customers, and the organization overall.

  • We collect detailed information about past and current cultural metrics and work collaboratively with a wide range of stakeholders to design strategies and programs which would deliver projected future results.
  • We coordinate between different departments to drive cultural transformation, while facilitating bottom-line results.
  • We focus on empowering and engaging everyone – from senior executives and board members to interns and individual contributors – participates in and benefits from the cultural transformation process in specific ways.

Connect with us for a 15-minute discussion about your specific needs around cultural transformation and we will provide you with a no-obligation quote for our upskilling and training services.

A Recipe for Greatness

(Transformation at the Individual, Team and Organizational Levels) –

FountainBlue’s March 2024 Blog

In my broad and deep travels I have encountered greatness in individuals, in teams and in organizations. This month, I asked myself, “What are the necessary qualities for greatness?” and came up with the list below. 

I’ve divided these qualities into the individual, team and organizational level. 

Every team has individuals with qualities of greatness. The magic of these teams, built from the greatness of their individuals, comes together to create a recipe for greatness within the organization as a whole. 

While prioritization of these qualities may vary as we adapt to changes,  it is my experience that each of these elements are foundational ingredients for greatness. 

Individual Level

  • Humility
    • Knowing yourself and humbly accepting your strengths and weaknesses will help you step into your potential and bring out the best in others around you.
  • Curiosity
    • Embracing the novice mindset no matter your experience level will help you see a more divergent and broader range of possibilities.
  • Openness
    • Being open to new experiences and possibilities supports growth and expansion, bringing positive and constructive energy to yourself and those around you.
  • Kindness
    • Adopting a kind outlook with yourself and others will help everyone be strong enough to adopt qualities of excellence as an individual, as a team, as an organization. 

Team Level 

  • Grace
    • Grace is a mark of humility, openness, kindness and curiosity for the full team.
  • Acceptance
    • Accepting the diverse range of perspectives across the team invites collaboration and synergistic thinking, contributing to sustainable team success.
  • Agility
    • Communicating and pivoting with agility, in concert as a team helps the team to grow, expand, and achieve exceptional results through a wide range of circumstances. 
  • Perseverance
    • Developing endurance to push through challenges and opportunities helps teams create ‘better together’ stories, which in turn, contribute to more success stories.

Organization Level 

  • Purpose
    • Providing clarity on the mission, vision, value and purpose of the organization defines WHY individuals, teams, partners, customers, engage, driving teams and individuals forward with momentum.
  • Drive
    • Managing and leading the organization well motivates and empowers teams and individuals to passionately to deliver on goals and commitments. 

Excellence is a journey, not a destination. But it’s also a North Star – a guiding star worth following.  

Transformation at the Individual Level

If you’re interested in having a 15-minute complimentary call about What’s Next for You, please think through these and other questions, so that we can feel prepared for our call:  

  1. What type of role and position are you looking for and why does that sound appealing to you?
  2. What does a successful next step look like for you?
  3. How has what you’ve done in the past positioned you to do this well? 
  4. What is the intersection between what you do well, what you enjoy doing, and where the market opportunities are?
  5. What have you done to date to help secure the desired role? What has worked and what hasn’t worked?
  6. In what way does your targeted role meet your desire to live a life of meaning and purpose?
  7. What else would you like to share about yourself, your background, your desired future state?

When you are ready, you may sign up for a complementary 15-minute coaching session by visiting https://cal.mixmax.com/fountainblue/whatsnext

Below is a brief description about living a life of meaning and purpose, in case it helps you think through what you’d like to do next.

Fresh from the transformational effects of a global pandemic, leaders at all levels, from all walks of life, through each decade are focusing on living a life which has purpose and meaning for them. But the problem is that it’s such a personalized and squishy concept.

What resonates for one won’t resonate for all. What we’ve done before doesn’t scratch the itch. It’s so overwhelming to feel a deep calling to DO SOMETHING, and then not knowing what to do and how to make a difference.

Email your thoughts to info@fountainblue.biz, or schedule a no-obligation zoom call by visiting https://cal.mixmax.com/fountainblue/purpose.

How we measure success

We measure success based on reports on team cohesion, team productivity, and team impact. Reported qualitative and quantitative outcomes include:

Improved Leadership Qualities

  • Greater Clarity and Prioritization
  • Greater Short-Term Focus
  • Larger and Broader Long-Term Focus
  • Renewed Commitment and Confidence

Refined Communication Skills

  • Better Frame Situations Based on Immediacy, Relevance, and Priorities
  • Better Understand and Communicate ‘Your Side of the Net’
  • Better Communicate Status and Ownership
  • Improved Speaking and Communication to Larger and More Diverse Audiences

Management Successes

  • Improved Decision-Making Skills
  • Enhanced Creativity and Innovation with the Team
  • Greater Effectiveness and Better Performance

Relationships and Networks

  • Improved Relationships within and Outside the Team
  • Larger Ecosystem of Partners and Providers
  • Longer-term Relationships with Larger Range of Partners
  • Improved Balance in all Aspects of Life
  • Increased Collaboration Across Teams

Our Background and Experience

Our process management successes are in the areas of software engineering, systems design and development, H/W-S/W integration, product line management, project development/ management and customer support for corporate and government organizations, with multi-site, multi-vendor and international organizations.

Our specific experience ranges from:

  • Shifting IT departments onto new platforms,
  • Growing teams quickly and exponentially, while improving performance and quality,
  • Merging and integrating corporate systems, software, operations and personnel.

Testimonials

Organizational Transformation

  • Linda was instrumental in advising us with the digital transformation process, integrating technological and process updates while informing and enabling our people.
  • Linda is a master at accepting and managing change, and at guiding us steadily as an organization to the next opportunity, given market and technology trends and customer requirements.

Team Transformation

  • Linda has the amazing ability to frame challenge as an opportunity, and helps us rapidly and energetically shift to what’s next.
  • Linda’s proactive and positive outlook is contagious, bringing great energy to our team.
  • Linda has challenged us to raise the bar, doing well while doing right.

Personal Transformation – see also Coaching testimonials

  • Linda has enabled and inspired me to continue to be a better version of myself.
  • Linda’s wisdom helped me manage my emotions while communicating directly.
  • Linda helped me show up fully as myself.

For more information, contact us at info@fountainblue.biz.